Obama DOJ: Black voters too dumb to vote w/o party affiliation

LOL according to basso, black people are so stupid they can only work as nannies

 

OK, I think I understand the issue, though it's hard with such a poorly written article and an intentionally provoking thread title.

As Major points out, here's the key passage...

The department ruled that white voters in Kinston will vote for blacks only if they are Democrats and that therefore the city cannot get rid of party affiliations for local elections because that would violate black voters' right to elect the candidates they want.

I read that as saying white voters would vote for blacks only if the blacks were Dems, which initially made no sense to me... why would white GOP voters not vote for blacks simply because they ran as a Republican? But, what they're really saying is that the only whites that will vote for a black are whites who are Democrats. In other words, a Black Republican would stand no chance of getting elected without party identification because of the racism of the white GOP voters. So, basso has condemned a decision by the Obama administration that protects the rarest of our political system: black Republicans.

Now, assuming the article is correct and I'm reading it correctly, the other reason for the decision is that blacks could not get elected without partisan white Dems also voting for black candidates. So, this seems like an evenhanded approach. In theory, it protects the minority candidates of both parties.

However, it has nothing to do with blacks being too dumb. That is very much a basso bias rearing it's ugly head.

 

Well, that's clearly not true because you posted another message in this thread 5 minutes after my post.

And now you've made another post hours later and still haven't said how you came to your offensive conclusion yet.

 

I may be reading the article wrong too, but I don't think this is what it's saying. I think it's saying the white people would only vote for white people in ordinary circumstances. But if there's an option to do a straight party ticket vote, then white people who vote straight party Democrat would end up voting for black people in the process. But without parties, there are no straight party tickets, so that wouldn't happen. At least, I think that's the reason - I got it from this part:

"Removing the partisan cue in municipal elections will, in all likelihood, eliminate the single factor that allows black candidates to be elected to office," Loretta King, who at the time was the acting head of the Justice Department's civil rights division, wrote in a letter to the city.

Ms. King wrote that voters in Kinston vote more along racial than party lines and without the potential for voting a straight Democratic ticket, "the limited remaining support from white voters for a black Democratic candidate will diminish even more."

As rocketsjudoka pointed out, I think this is a weird use of the Voting Rights Act and doesn't make any sense at all. The thread actually could have had merit. However:

This is spot-on. Basso either has no idea what he's posting or he's made an unfounded racist allegation.

 

The issue is a change in voting procedures which in this case means a change from partisan to non-partisan elections so in this case party affiliation has everything to do with the voting rights act.

[rquoter]Kinston is one of the areas subject to provisions of the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act, which requires the city to receive Justice Department approval before making any changes to voting procedures. Kinston is one of 12,000 voting districts in areas of 16 states, almost exclusively in the South, that the Voting Rights Act declared to have had a history of racial discrimination.[/rquoter]

 

To follow on Major's point I think the argument being made is that there are many voters who vote straight ticket with little concern about other factors. Once that factor is removed then decisions will be made based on race.

 

That's groovy and all, basso, and a tasty beverage, no doubt, but how you can be civilized in such a fashion and then spew out this dribble says less about the cognac and more about you.

 

Quoted for truth.

Really classy thread title there basso. You've outdone yourself once again sir!

 

I think the problem for Republicans is the fact that American women and blacks have decided to not fall for figure heads that dont shares their point of views. Get a black guy or are woman and they will vote for us even though our policies go against everything these people believe in or benefactor for these people. Conservatives are a joke and they continue to be just that.

 

I think the DOJ may think that, but that means they are assuming that everyone is a racist. It also makes me think that the DOJ doesn't think that the majority of the voters in the region can't think for themselves and didn't make the right decision when they voted & will not make good decisions when they vote later (most of those voters being black - this is where Basso's "too dumb" statement comes in to play ---and NO I'm NOT defending the thread title)

It was my thought that if you remove party affiliation, then the voters actually have to listen to, and research the candidates & will make decisions on who to vote for that actually might align better with that voters beliefs.

 

OK, I'm still confused based on the original article, and according to Google, we still only have wingnut sources for this story and every wingnut source is based on the Washington Times article. I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that when you have a poorly written story appearing in the Washington Times that is them trumpeted by the likes of Limbaugh, Red State, FOX, Hot Air and NRO, it probably means we're missing a key part of the story.

 

No, that's not it. Similar, if not verbatim language is in every wingnut screed I glanced at... you people obviously feel it's either important or clever to include that phrase.

 

I thought you went out of your way to show thart winfgnutts were of different races.

 

It is clever - if you were too ignorant to know that the Civil Rights Division generally handles all voting rights cases - which I guess they don't, that's why it's important to point it out (as it confirms my first post in this thread).

 

Not racist, ideologist.

 

Neither. I was being a dumbist.

 

The problem with Basso's statement is that he is saying that black voters are too dumb when the implication would be actually that white voters are too dumb since they will only vote party line without considering factors like race.

The Voting Rights Act is specifically meant to address race so yes it means that under it localities like Kinston the electorate is considered racist. Given though the results of the last vote I do question about how valid that is in the here and now which is why I raised that in an earlier post. Unfortunately that issue has been largely overshadowed by a misleading, or plain dumb, thread title.

That might be so but the Voting Rights Act isn't specifically defending party affiliation just considering how voting regulations may or not be discrimanatory. IN this case they feel that changing the rules regarding party affiliation would be discriminatory.